


A Chat About Memories

by lacepockets



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers Spoilers, Gen, Post-Patch 5.0: Shadowbringers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-03
Updated: 2019-09-03
Packaged: 2020-10-06 10:41:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,142
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20505638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lacepockets/pseuds/lacepockets
Summary: A slightly aimless little story about my Warrior of Light, Naya Faulke, being visited one fine day by the Crystal Exarch. As it takes place after the main story quest of Shadowbringers, it contains spoilers.





	A Chat About Memories

The songs of birds made for a peaceful sound backdrop as they filtered through open windows. A gentle breeze floated in, carrying with it the pleasant perfume of the planted flowers resting prettily on the sill, their petals dancing to the soft orchestration of the wind. Naya Faulke, sequestered as she was in the small apartment of sorts that she shared with Kyron in the Pendants, idly mused over how the birds of the First must be as resilient as the remaining people. She turned the page in the tome she was reading — an in-depth historical text about this world at large — and lounged comfortably in the chair she had dragged to the open window. It was a quiet, peaceful day, something she was immensely thankful for after the emotion-saturated confrontation with Hades.  
  
Her eyebrows twitched, and she almost frowned. The things they had learned from Emet-Selch, from the shades of Amaurot... it had been astonishing, to say the absolute least, and she and Kyron hadn't even given themselves the chance to process it yet. They were certainly due for a long, heavy talk.  
  
A soft knock on the door tore her from her distracted reading, and she bent the corner of the page to mark it before answering. Who would be coming to their room rather than simply using a linkpearl? She could think of only a couple people, all those indisposed to use linkpearls in the first place.  
  
Opening the door revealed the shrouded visage of the Crystal Exarch. He was smiling in his kindly way, though Naya could immediately see that his injuries had yet to fully heal; bruises and clean scrapes adorned his skin. She smiled in turn.  
  
"Ah, the Crystal Exarch himself! To what do I owe the honor of this visit?" she said, her tone whimsical as it so often was.  
  
The Exarch laughed good-naturedly but waved his crystalline hand dismissively. "Please, my presence is not so much as to be called an honor. May I come in? If you're not busy, that is."  
  
Naya nodded once and stepped aside to allow him entry, letting the door close once they were both inside. He stood in the middle of the room, his head panning around as if looking for something; she figured he was wondering where the other Warrior of Light was. He certainly wouldn’t be searching for any ghosts.  
  
"And you just so happen to visit when Kyron is engaged elsewhere. My, whatever am I to think?" she continued with her light teasing. He spun around to look at her, a swish of robes and the light _clink_ of crystal.  
  
"Wh— I-I assure you I had no ulterior motive! I simply came to speak with you, and I had no idea that you were alone! I would never—" he blurted, flailing his hands desperately.  
  
"Calm yourself," Naya interrupted, laughing. "'tis only a jest. I imagine this must be some manner of official business?"  
  
"Official? No, not exactly... As I said, I wished to speak with you, but I'd hoped to do so on a more friendly level." Despite his words, the Exarch had the kindly smile that he gave to everyone plastered on his face — that charming if mysterious smile which probably had no small part in his current position in the world. Naya studied him, the tip of her long, luxuriant tail swaying to and fro.  
  
"Then why do you hide yourself?" she asked, gesturing vaguely at the hood drawn over his head and casting an obscuring shadow over his face. She watched him wring his hands, a nervous habit he seemed to have picked up at some point in the messy timeline of his life. Then, with a soft sigh of resignation, he pushed his hood down and leveled her with his crimson eyes. For her part, Naya smiled sweetly; it really was good to see him again.  
  
"Better?" he asked, playfully exasperated.  
  
"I must say, I much prefer you as my old friend G'raha Tia, rather than the Crystal Exarch,” she commented, shifting her weight to one hip so she could place a hand confidently upon it. She faltered, though, when she noticed the telltale glint in his eyes; he was close to tears. "—ah, I'd not meant—"  
  
He waved dismissively again, and with a forceful blink the glint was gone. Or at least hidden. "It's nothing so serious. I'm just still not accustomed to hearing my name again, and each time you say it, it stirs something within me. It has been so long, after all."  
  
Naya nodded in as much understanding as she had. It was difficult to empathize with the notion of living for as long as he had, even if he’d spent much of it in slumber, but she knew some things must be almost foreign to him by this point. As he had already since admitted, his name sometimes scarcely felt like his name; it had been at least one hundred years since he’d heard it.  
  
She moved to the table in the kitchenette area and gestured for G'raha to have a seat. "So, what was it you came to speak to me about?"  
  
G'raha sat himself in one of the chairs before answering. It seemed like he had to gather his thoughts all over again after she had thrown him off track. "I don't know that I had anything specific," he laughed. "I— we—… Do you remember how we used to talk about our findings regarding the Crystal Tower, or all the books we'd read?"  
  
Naya sat at the table across from him, her lips pulled into a fond if small smile. Of course she remembered; though it had been over a hundred years for him, for her it had only been three. G'raha had left quite an impression on her besides, and she had vowed that he would be someone she would never forget. Truthfully, she never forgot anyone she and Kyron met on their journeys, but some left more of themselves with her than others, and G’raha Tia was certainly one.  
  
"Yes, of course. Our time with NOAH is among my favorite memories."  
  
G'raha's eyes flashed to hers for a moment before he looked away to nothing in particular. He had learned over the years to hide some of his deeper, more troubling feelings, and at times it made his face almost impossible to read. "I suppose that even after all this time, at my core still lies a thirst for knowledge. A desire to make known the unknown. That may never change, if I'm being honest."  
  
"A feeling I know all too well," Naya said fondly. But something about the way G'raha was speaking seemed almost... regretful. It made a niggling concern sit at the back of her mind.  
  
"Now as I am bound to the Tower, there are many things I am privy to — things that I would have not even conceived of before. And yet, still there are things that confound me."  
  
What would confound him at this point? Regarding him pensively, Naya tried to think if there was some seed of knowledge she had that he didn’t. If there was, would he truly even desire that knowledge? Some things are perhaps better left unsaid, even despite an inherent thirst for understanding. As it so happened, he was asking after one of those things.  
  
"Emet-Selch... it is my understanding that he is one and the same as Solus zos Galvus. An Ascian who had a hand in the founding of the Garlean Empire... and Allag as well. But what eludes me is, what is his connection to you and Kyron? Why was he so interested in the two of you specifically?"  
  
Naya balked, and straightened in her seat. “Surely because we are the Warriors of Light. We have been as thorns in the sides of Ascians for years now. I imagine that would pique their interest.”  
  
“It seemed deeper than that, to me,” G’raha gently plied, tilting his head. “More… personal, if you will. Had he known you?”  
  
Sudden anxiety welled up in the pit of Naya's stomach. They had come to the core of a subject that she'd rather not broach in this moment — something she hadn't allowed herself to think about to any serious capacity since learning of it. It frightened her on a level she couldn't put into words, felt like a yawning hole in her chest that could never be filled. To acknowledge it was to fall into the hole and be forced to understand her very soul. To know that she was a part of something greater, something that had spanned millennia and had had an end most tragic.  
  
When all she wanted, really, was to continue to be nothing more than a champion of the people, of the world.  
  
It had felt like time and space themselves had come to a complete stop when these revelations were originally revealed to her, and now was no different. She felt like she was moving through the space between worlds again, and time was rendered insignificant. Everything around her became odd, as if it suddenly wasn't real; the singing of birds outside the window became static, and G'raha's face looked flat and unmoving as if he were a painting.  
  
She could vaguely hear a voice echoing in her head, though she couldn't tell whose it was or if it was even real; she couldn’t even tell if it was male or female.  
  
"—ya? Naya!"  
  
She was snapped out of her fugue just as suddenly as she had entered it. She blinked several times, shook her head, and placed a hand against her temple.  
  
"A-are you alright, Naya?" G'raha's concern was plain; he sounded very alarmed. His ears were flat against his head and at some point he'd risen from his seat and reached for her. He was close enough now that a simple movement of a hand would bring him to touching her.  
  
"Y...yes... My apologies. I felt unwell for just a moment."  
  
“Was that the Echo? No, it wasn’t, was it? What happened?” G’raha sat back down, but remained on the edge of his seat, poised for something to happen again. It wasn’t the Echo indeed; it hadn’t been painful as those visions always were, and she had seen nothing. It was an unanswered existential riddle.  
  
She forced a smile, though it probably looked much more melancholy than she’d intended. “It wasn’t. I… I have much to think about, and the weight of it is great. Forgive me that I would keep it to myself a while longer.”  
  
That reply didn’t seem to actually satisfy him, but he accepted it with as much grace as he could. He stared at her unemotionally for the span of a few moments, then sighed, and leaned back into the chair. He wasn’t exactly one for breaching someone’s barriers of privacy, but the lack of an answer of any substance was still disappointing. At the moment, as it were, Naya didn’t have any real answer for him anyway — and he could sense that much. A rather awkward silence filled the room, broken only by the bird songs from the window, and the two miqo’te just sat and regarded each other for some time. Naya felt a little bad, that he had come here apparently with this weighing on his mind and yet she was disinclined to talk about it for the time being. Should she change the subject, try to direct the conversation elsewhere to save face? Or would G’raha be disinterested in anything else?  
  
She decided to take the chance, and she knew just the thing — something that is relaxing and a common interest. “Could I perhaps interest you in some tea? I’ve only what has been delivered to this room thus far, but I’m sure there’s something to your taste.”  
  
G’raha seemed to come back to life with this, his ears perking back up to their original positions. “Oh, yes, that would be wonderful.”  
  
“Do you still prefer spiced varieties?” she inquired over her shoulder as she left her chair. She had a very distinct memory of G’raha, as she knew him, wanting to only drink the brews imported from Thavnair that made heavy use of cinnamon and cloves. In fact, the scent of those spices was among the very first things she noticed about him all those years ago. It hung around him like a cologne, and she had discovered the source of it upon finding him lounging on the limb of a tree with a thick tome and steaming cup of tea. Now, though, he mostly smelled of dusty old books and the indistinct aroma of aether.  
  
There was a moment during which G’raha was silent, and he blinked in confusion. But then he couldn’t help but laugh. “Did I…? I have to admit, you most likely remember more of me than I do.”  
  
“I seem to remember a young man who refused any brew that did not… how did he say it, ‘tease the nose and inspire the most sagely of wisdom’?”  
  
G’raha’s left hand came to rest over his face, and he laughed again in embarrassment. “Did I really say that? Gods…” After a slow head shake, he lowered his hand back into his lap. “Far be it from this old man to deny any such hospitality. I will gladly take whatever you have.”  
  
As she set the tea to steep, Naya looked over her shoulder to the man sitting at the table, and her eyes traveled over his form, examining him and then settling on his face. She smiled in a way that was both sympathetic and a bit amused. “You don’t seem to be as old as you imply. You look much the same as when we were investigating the Tower together… save a few details.”  
  
She watched him draw his left hand up his right arm — his crystallized arm — and he chuckled awkwardly. “Is that so…” he wondered aloud sheepishly. “Youthful as I may look, I must admit I know not my own age. I slumbered until the advent of the Eighth Umbral Calamity, and I’ve resided in the First for a hundred years or so.”  
  
Naya turned around fully to look at him, leaning herself back against the counter. She crossed her arms as she regarded him. She had to suppose he was a bit different than she remembered; namely, he seemed to have lost his feisty nature and replaced it with the kind of calm wisdom that can only result from living as long as he did in the circumstances he had. That much was plenty understandable, and so it was no small wonder that she and Kyron didn’t recognize him right away from his personality alone. They certainly did recognize him once his cowl’s hood came off.  
  
“You’ve changed as well,” he said, calling back her attention. One of her thick brows quirked.  
  
“Have I?” Truth be told, she didn’t feel all that changed, but with recent events she hadn’t much time nor desire for true introspection. She supposed that the three years since she met G’raha, relatively speaking, was enough time for personal change.  
  
He put the side of his finger to his chin in thought. “There’s a melancholy in you. I can see it behind your eyes, even when you smile, though it is deep.”  
  
Naya blinked in surprise — a bit astounded that G’raha could read her so well… or perhaps, even after everything, despite her attempts to keep it under lock and key for protection, she still wore her heart on her sleeve.  
  
“I see,” she responded slowly, at length. A sad smile spread onto her face. “Well, much has happened, after all.”  
  
It was then that the tea finished brewing, and so she broke away from the conversation briefly to pour it into simple teacups, handing one to G’raha and cradling the other in her hands as she resumed sitting.  
  
“Tell me.”  
  
“Hmm? I thought that you know already of our deeds and trials, further even into the future than we.”  
  
G’raha took a sip of his tea, apparently not caring about the heat. His ears flicked — it was delicious.  
  
“I want to hear it from you,” he insisted, “and Kyron as well, whensoever he returns. To hear of the ventures of the Warriors of Light from their own lips, and not the stoic text of a history tome… I can think of no greater thing.”  
  
Naya remembered a recent evening on a cliffside in Kholusia, when the Crystal Exarch had waxed poetic about his forlorn desire to be with the Warriors of Light once more, and most of all, to be taken on an adventure. It had touched her and her husband deeply, though they could do nothing but lament their inability to make his dream come true. She recalled even having a fleeting desire to rouse the G’raha of their time and take him by hand to experience some sort of escapade so that he would never be left wanting. She had since come to terms with the fact that that may simply be impossible. Or so she thought, at least; that inclination bubbled up inside her once again.  
  
“Would that we were able to take you with us and have you see these things firsthand, Raha.”  
  
A chord was struck deep within G’raha’s heart. He stared at Naya, stupefied — lips parted just a hair and eyes wide. A tear ran down his cheek unbidden, and he wiped it away quickly.  
  
Naya leaned forward in his direction, gripping her teacup tightly. “Ah, er, I’m sorry, was that too improper? I… I should have asked if I could—”  
  
“Say it again,” he interrupted, “please.”  
  
Again he had her blinking in surprise. She recognized then that he had but a simple wish — to be called by his name by the Warriors of Light, with no impersonal niceties such as tribal titles barring the way. To him, it was probably the greatest honor to be that close to the ones he had once called his inspiration, to be true friends with his heroes.  
  
“Raha.”  
  
Her voice came out gently, a sort of soft reverence that came from knowing the weight of this. She watched his lip quiver, much the same as it did when she had told him she was glad to see him awake, and he blinked forcefully, sending a stream of tears cascading down his cheeks. Abandoning her teacup on the table, she came over to him and yanked him into an embrace without any hesitation, pulling a gasp from him and then more tears.  
  
“Shall I tell you a story?” she asked.  
  
“Please do,” he answered, his voice a little muffled by her embrace and shaky from his flood of feelings. She heard him sniffle.  
  
“’tis an old tale, beginning millennia ago…”


End file.
